PittFind

Inspiration# About the Project

PittFind was inspired by the challenge of navigating the large University of Pittsburgh campus and staying updated on student-run events. As students, we often found it difficult to quickly locate buildings, figure out walking routes, and know what was happening around campus. This project brings all of those features together into a single, interactive tool.

What We Learned

Through this project, we learned how to:

Integrate Leaflet.js with OpenStreetMap tiles to render a responsive map.
Build a Flask backend to handle event creation, deletion, and building data.
Use SQLite as a lightweight database for storing buildings and events.
Design clean UI/UX with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to make navigation intuitive.
Implement features like walking directions and geolocation for a better user experience.

How We Built It

Frontend: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and Leaflet for map rendering.
Backend: Flask routes for serving data, managing events, and connecting to the database.
Database: SQLite for persistent storage of events and building information.
Map Data: OpenStreetMap tiles integrated with Leaflet for free and open map rendering.

Challenges

Some of the biggest challenges we faced included:

Pathfinding: Implementing walking directions between buildings required carefully handling map coordinates and user inputs.
Event Management: Ensuring that event creation, deletion, and updating worked smoothly while syncing with the database.
User Experience: Balancing the number of features while keeping the UI simple and intuitive.
Debugging Integration: Making the frontend, backend, and database all communicate correctly was a steep learning curve.

Overall, PittFind taught us how to go from concept to a fully working full-stack application. It combined web development, database design, and geospatial rendering into one project—an experience that pushed our technical and creative problem-solving skills